PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — The latest from the TV Critics Association winter meeting that began Thursday in Pasadena, California (all times are local):
7 p.m.
The final season of Fox TV’s “New Girl” will debut April 10, picking up the characters’ lives a few years after they were last seen.
After the sixth season of “New Girl” aired last year, it looked as if the show starring Zooey Deschanel had come to an end. But creator and producer Elizabeth Meriwether enlisted the cast to lobby Fox for one more season, and they were rewarded with eight episodes.
Picking up three years after the events of last season, “New Girl” finds some characters settled into adulthood.
Hannah Simone, who plays Cece, said “a pretty main character” dies, but she didn’t elaborate in a Q&A session with TV critics Thursday.
With the additional episodes, the coming-of-age story about young adults has the chance to finish their story for viewers, said “New Girl” producer Brett Baer.
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4:30 p.m.
Dylan McDermott says there’s a happy twist to the many years of being confused with fellow actor Dermot Mulroney.
The two appear together on screen for the first time in McDermott’s new Fox sitcom, “LA to Vegas,” with Mulroney guest starring as a rival airline pilot. The pair hit it off after the “rivalry” stretching back 30 years and now are friends, McDermott told TV critics Thursday.
The oft-noted similarity between their names and their vague resemblance prompted a 2012 “Saturday Night Live” skit mocking the confusion. McDermott said he was mystified by the mix-up’s durability and why people didn’t tire of the joke.
At one point, he said, it was suggested one of them make a name change. McDermott said he and Mulroney were represented by the same agency when famed agent Sue Mengers declared, “There can only be one,” McDermott recalled, mimicking the late Mengers’ gruff delivery.
McDermott joked that he toyed with becoming Mick Dermott.
“LA to Vegas” cast member Nathan Lee Graham asked McDermott if he and Mulroney blamed each other for losing roles.
No, McDermott replied with a smile, but when he turned in a bad performance he would blame it on Mulroney.
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1:15 p.m.
Producer Ryan Murphy says he expressed concern about how his edgy fare including FX Networks’ “American Horror Story” will fit into the pending Fox-Disney deal.
Murphy said Thursday that he told Disney CEO Robert Iger he was worried he’d have to put Mickey Mouse in his shows after Disney buys Fox assets including FX Networks.
The Disney chief reassured him that wasn’t the case and that the deal was being made because Disney believes in Fox and its creative contributors, Murphy says.
While he says he’s taking heart from how companies such as Pixar and Marvel have fared as part of the Disney empire, Murphy says he’ll see how things pan out before making any decisions.
Last month, Disney said it was buying a large part of the Murdoch family’s 21st Century Fox for about $52.4 billion in stock, including its film and TV studios and cable and international TV businesses including FX Networks.
The deal doesn’t include the Fox Broadcasting network and stations, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, FS1, FS2 and Big Ten Network.
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11:30 a.m.
The Fox broadcasting network, home to “The Simpsons” and “The Orville,” will continue to carry scripted entertainment after the Fox TV studio’s sale to Disney.
Fox Television Group CEOs Dana Walden and Gary Newman says the announced sale that will split up Fox and the 20th Century Fox studio won’t turn Fox into a platform solely for sports and other live programming.
Speculation arose after Fox founder Rupert Murdoch talked about so-called “New Fox” as an entity for news and sports that the Fox network would drop scripted programming.
But he was referring to the entity and not specifically the broadcast network, the executives told a TV critics’ meeting Thursday.
Last month, Disney said it was buying a large part of the Murdoch family’s 21st Century Fox for about $52.4 billion in stock, including its film and TV studios and cable and international TV businesses. The deal doesn’t include the Fox Broadcasting network and stations, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, FS1, FS2 and Big Ten Network.
Newman says he believes the deal will pass regulatory muster in fairly quick fashion and that it will be business as usual for the next 12 to 18 months as the process plays out.